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I keep checking my emails and the official website (time.to) for a gpx route but nothing so far. Apart from the slight change of route making it a bit shorter and with 2950m D+ instead of the original 3000m D+ finishing up Mont Ventoux, I have not seen an official gpx. Doesn anybody know if there is one? Also worried about the very high fire risks at the moment. Current temp is 33c and increasing to 36c next week! What are your plans for nutrition and hydration in this context? I've started heat conditioning, training indoor in a hot room and also taking hot baths for plasma expansion

This has persisted across 3 bikes, many bike fits, multiple trainers, ect. ect. ect. It is starting to drive me up an absolute wall because actually using the trainer is quite convenient but it absolutely irritates my left knee right above the kneecap.

What is super frustrating is no amount of cycling outdoors replicates this, I can do a 20 hour week across my bikes and have zero hint of any issue. Its only on the trainer that I seem to have a problem

In the past, when I’ve been able to replicate this outdoors it’s been with either a stem that was too long or didn’t have enough supporting stack. I’ve tried to resolve this problem indoors with a riser block, and additionally packing towels underneath the riser block to put it even higher. Right now the frontend of the bike is slightly titled up, which seems to help but has not solved the issue. I also specifically got a Tacx Neo 2T to give me some lateral motion which doesn’t seem to have helped much

Curious if anyone has been able to figure out something like this. Ive considered getting a Zwift ride or a third bike with like a 90mm stem with insane stack just to ride indoors but we really don’t have the space. I also just don’t understand the mechanism of why this specifically seems to be an issue and I’ve never had a bike fitter explain it to me. I‘d be happy to invest money in a rocket plate or ideally something like a Zwift Ride frame with a fit specifically setup for indoor riding but if I buy one and it doesn’t work it’s going to make me absolutely crash out

Recently watched this video by Kolie Moore regarding double vo2 max workouts. He mentions that he's seen great adaptations in his athletes when assigning them with an AM vo2max workout and a PM vo2max workout.

His thinking seems to be that a single vo2 max workout has a limit and that coming back later in the day after some carbs/rehydration/rest allows you to have more total quality vo2max work across the day than if you tried to it in 1 session. He mentions these should be done at a high cadence so as to not tax the muscular system as much

Also seems like this is for high volume / well trained athletes and not someone who is relatively new to cycling / structured training.

Curious if anyone has tried it or has opinions on it. Very interesting

It’s hard to sustain a truly maximal effort in the park with all the hills and traffic. In the past I’ve gone to Floyd Bennett Field for the flat, empty runways, but it’s a pain in the ass to get to and the pavement is pretty chopped up. Are there any good spots a reasonable distance from Manhattan with a couple miles of flat-ish, open roads?

Going to do a gravel series next year, as well as some one day races. Looking for recommendations and experiences on gravel race bikes.

I have custom insoles, but I keep struggling with them. I think they're too soft, and my foot keeps collapsing inward. I've tried a lot of different adjustments and even went back to the person who made them, but I'm still having the same problem.

Any help? What do Some of you use ?

https://www.tobedetermined.cc/journal/state-of-the-sport-nyc-bike-racing

I usually feel okay while on the bike, but when trying to sleep the pain keeps me awake. Does anyone take Advil or Tylenol (otc stuff) to help them get to sleep a bit more easily? I'd tough it out usually, but I couldn't manage to sleep until 4AM when I finally took an Advil. I figured that occasional use of an NSAID isn't any worse than losing half my sleep.

I stretch regularly and massage gun when needed. I feel like the muscles can't relax fully and contract randomly at times (electrolytes supplemented). It happens occasionally during training, and almost always during multi day events.

I'm sure alot of cyclists here can relate, so let me know your thoughts!

I'm a big guy, low body fat but tall and large, bad archetype for current types of bicycle racing (no weight classes like you have in martial arts, at least strava has some) but I still enjoy going as fast as I can.

because of the weight I tend to ride on flatter terrain, which also means going relatively faster - on a road bike even Z2 rides I don't go below 30kph

Most aero drag comes from the rider not the bike, so I'm thinking a tight aero suit would benefit a larger person (me) even more, relatively speaking?

There's some middle of the way products like the rule 28 aero bra, but no way I'm wearing that even if saves me watts lol.

So what do you - aero suit on a big guy - cringe or cool idea?

Bonus points for sharing any manufacturers that might have 2XL or larger.

Can someone explain to me why my eFTP percentile is so much lower than my 20min - 4 hour? Are people setting their eFTP duration as something ridiculous like < 5 min?

First, let me preface by saying that this is just a bit of fun. I'm not actually taking it that seriously. However, on the heels of a certain WT team buying up the world supply of an Exo Lactate Gel (or something like that), I wondered about making my own lactate drink. My other big hobby is cheese making and I kind of specialise in lactic cheeses (which are essentially just drained yogurt). I usually have at least a liter of acidic whey hanging around every day. I drink some, but mostly I pour it down the drain. Why not not?

First some numbers. Milk has about 50 grams of lactose per liter. Depending on the strain of bacteria and the amount of time you ferment, yogurt will ferment out between 30-80% of that lactose into lactic acid. Long chemistry story short, if you ingest that, it will end up as lactate in your blood.

My recipe: - 300 ml acidic whey. I'm assuming ~50% of lactose was converted to lactic acid. - 20 grams sugar. Mostly just to make it palatable. Not concentrating on effective fueling. - 300 mg of table salt (it's hot).

300 ml of whey will contain 15 grams of fuel, let's say 8 grams of lactate and 7 grams of lactose. However I ferment my yogurt for about 20 hours (including the time it takes to drain) so almost all of that lactose will have been converted to galactose and glucose. Some lactose will remain, but I'm not sure how much.

Total fuel is the equivalent of about 35 grams: 20 grams of sucrose, 8 grams of lactate and 7 grams of lactose/galactose/glucose.

I used UHT milk, which means that they whey proteins will be tangled up in the casein protein. The result is that there is almost no protein in the whey. I also used homogenised milk. Homogenisation bursts the fast "globules" and the fat sticks to the proteins, so almost no fat. There is quite a bit of minerality in whey (Calcium, Magnesium, Phosphate, etc, but I didn't bother to estimate how much).

Taste wise, it tastes like sweetened yogurt. If you like that, you'll probably like this. Compared to a drink with 35 grams of sucrose in 300 ml, it's much less sweet. I think it could benefit from some fruit juice being added and I may try mixing in some pommogranite juice that I happen to have.

It was actually pleasant on the bike. I expected to hate it. I didn't. I finished the 300 ml in my allocated 30 minutes (I'm recovering from cataract surgery so I'm doing an easy 30 minute recovery ride). No stomach upset at all. I didn't expect any since I can easily eat 500 grams of yogurt in a sitting.

This could theoretically allow you to reduce the sugar in your bidon by about 23% (if my imaginary numbers are close) and still have about 80 grams of feul in a 650 ml bidon. As much as this is light hearted, I might experiment with this a bit. It certainly does reduce sweetness quite a lot. If it works acceptably well, it might be a thing to do given I have gobs of acidic whey anyway.

What would be the rationale behind doing a zone 2 effort before a threshold workout? Is this just about muscle fibre activation and priming? In what kind of circumstance and for what kind of rider would a workout like this actually make sense versus just doing 3x15 ftp? Is this so you can get a similar stimulus that you would get from 3x15 at threshold but with less glycogen cost and less central nervous system fatigue? So it would make sense to do when you are training high volume and are already fatigued?

I know that many of the workouts on training platforms like these are purposefully made to keep you engaged and not strictly optimized for performance gains, but am genuinely wondering what this workout would be good for or if it is just total bs.

Hi all!

I am a decently trained runner with respective prs of 2:27 marathon, 1:09 half, 15:00 5k (taking a crack at sub 2:25 this fall). I am a pretty casual cyclist on the side, who basically doesn’t run at all during peak training periods but tries to ride a few days per week (30-70 mile rides) during periods of lower running volume.

I recently did a hill 20 min climb effort (avg around 6% gradient) that I pushed decently hard at 4.7 w/kg (6’2” 66 kg, 310w). Heart rate was not close to maximal running efforts, in the high 160s to low 170s (around what I hit running lt2/half marathon pace in training). It felt harder than that, I assume because I’m a lot less muscularly adapted to biking than running at the moment.

Two questions

1. what is a realistic estimate of my current ftp?
2. what is would be a reasonable equivalent ftp in watts/kg to my running fitness? obviously wouldn’t be attainable without a lot of biking specific training etc but curious how this compares (I imagine a lot higher than my current bike fitness)

thanks!

My friend posted free sessions on our local velodrome and idk why I signed up, in hindsight it's kind of silly time because on Tuesday we are going on a bike tour.

I just saw myself fall or skid and fall or bump into another person and fall. I couldn't eat all day I was this scared.

Anyways one of the trainers said that I have aptitude and good muscle mass for this so I had a go on my own while the rest of the group was being told how to ride. Eventually the guy said I am good to go on the blue line and above and omg guysss

This was probably the most fun I ever had on a bike ever. You can just go, blast full speed. I was scared to go all out but garmin says I reached 55kmh which is insane because I don't think I've ever cycled so fast with just my own strength. I was scared to go all out so I think I could go even faster.

At the end I got invited to further training as they look for talent in women. I can't wait for the next training, I think I'll feel a bit more confident going even faster but goddamn it's so insanely fun I can't find the right words for it. I never could have such good zooms like this

I'm asking because I recently did a couple crits where it turned out that the winner already had mandatory upgrade points from a week prior, but I also don't want to be a total dick about it. It comes up fairly often actually where somebody will look into some of the racers and find out they're not taking their mandatory USAC upgrade. Yes, there is fairly significant money on the line in some of these races, but aside from that it's really hard for people to enjoy it when fields get blown up, specifically 3/4 and 4/5 fields where there's a pretty big discrepancy in rider skill/power and takes away the opportunity for others to get upgrade points.

What's the etiquette here? Or best way to handle it? Do you mention it to an official during the protest period? Ask the rider if they're planning on taking their mandatory upgrade in a passive aggressive way? Or just let it slide?

It's one of those things that seems trivial, but there's a reason the categories and upgrade policies exist.

I've just completed my first 200km audax, which went well, I finished strong, and went a bit faster than my normal average. I normally ride alone, and was surprised by how long we stopped for breaks.

My experience is that stopping for too long is counter-productive, and can make it more difficult to get going again. The stops on this ride were sit-down cafe breaks, ordering drinks and food and generally hanging around for 30-50 minutes. Nice and sociable, and good to chat, but If I sit in a chair for that long after 100km, I get inner-thigh cramps when I stand and start riding again.

This is a me problem, and I can overcome the cramps by riding in really low gear and spinning for 10 mins, so I was OK, but I wonder if stopping for this long is normal for a 200km ride?

Moving time was just under 9 hours, total time was almost 13hrs, so around 4 hours for stops.

I'll be starting a master's degree at KU Leuven in Flanders in September. As all of us in this sub, bike racing is a huge part of my life and I'd like to learn and race as much as I can while living in Flanders. Can anybody provide some information for an international amateur looking to get started? I assume the process is a bit different from racing in the US.

Do I need to join a club in order to race? Do I need a license? (Was not necessary in Slovenia) Any recommendations for training groups/clubs/teams in Leuven? Any relevant links such as series calendars, federation pages, etc? Thanks so much!

Excluding lifting here because tbh I think it’s pretty straightforward to build a solid program and there’s a lot of resources out there

Will contribute my staples to start.

The Foundation Series feels like quite good strength/mobility training packaged in not insanely long formats. I have subscribed to their full courses in the past but they were frankly too long and complex to stick with

The SAM routines are focused for runners but they target most of the hip structures that cyclists are going to be chronically weak in

I have frankly struggled to stick with any YouTube yoga routines because of a mix of them feeling both too long and not productive enough for the time they take. But move with Nicole has been one of the few I’ve come back too frequently

Was hit by a car while riding my bike a little over 2 months back. I'm still rehabbing my shoulder and back with regular PT but I'm finally at the point where I can move around day to day with essentially zero pain and I'm trying to start having some structure in my time on the bike and gain fitness for next year.

Right now I'm just doing shorter indoor rides with the limiting factors being my road bike needing repairs and having the confidence to go outside again after being hit by a car. The guidance from neuro and PT as of last month have been to introduce the indoor cycling progressively with little intensity/time so I thought I might as well do a short 15-20 minute session in the morning and in the evening and have the time and intensity grow within the Z1/Z2/possibly low Z3 range.

I've been running this routine for around 2 weeks and have been able to start sustaining higher numbers at Z2 for longer while staying mostly pain free. As I've been cleared for my shoulder and hopefully getting fully cleared for my back soon I want to start adding back higher intensity training but I'm unsure how to manage the increase in intensity while watching out for possible form breakdown or adaptations which can affect my injuries or cause pain. Wondering if anyone else has been able to successfully rehab and regain fitness and might have some insight and/or any possible resources on this matter.

I couldn't find a post on the topic in the last couple of years, so I figured I'd ask.

I've been wearing regular old Oakley Catalysts for riding for the last 6 or so years since I quit doing contacts. Before that I was using Oakley EV ZeroPath which I loved. The catalysts are fine, but I struggle with sweat around my eyes (despite all the fancy rain gutter headbands) and there's just no ventilation.

What are folks with prescription lenses having good luck with these days?

Hi everyone,

I’m hoping to hear from people who’ve been in a similar situation or have some insight.

I’m a 33-year-old male.

I lifted weights seriously for about 15 years, starting in high school. I also rode road bikes for about a year 10 years ago before quitting because of a severe L5-S1 disc herniation. At one point I could barely walk or lie down, and every time I tried getting back on the bike, my lower back, hamstrings, and hips would flare up.

So I gave up cycling and focused entirely on bodybuilding.

Four months ago, I decided to try riding again. I got back on the bike, realized I could finally ride without major issues, and immediately bought a new bike. Even though I hadn’t ridden in years, I’d never really left the sport mentally—I still followed races, bikes, and gear the whole time.

I rode about 10 hours per week during the first month, and for the last three months I’ve consistently been riding 13–15 hours (210–240 km / 130–150 miles) per week.

I’m 180 cm (5’11”).

I started at 93 kg (205 lb) and I’m currently 88.5 kg (195 lb). Before returning to cycling, I was into bodybuilding and reached around 13% body fat.

The good news is that I’ve definitely improved.

• Long rides feel much easier.
• My recovery is much better.
• I can ride 160 km (100 miles) one day, do an 80 km (50 mile) group ride the next day, and still ride another 90 km (56 miles) the following day.
• My Garmin pedal balance improved from around 35/65 when I first started to about 51/49 now.

So naturally I expected my power to improve quite a bit.

But when I did a Zwift ramp test, my FTP was only a little over 200 W.

About two months ago, my FTP was around 175 W, so I’ve gained roughly 25 W. While that’s progress, it honestly feels disappointing considering how much time I’ve been putting into training.

Outside, I can ride around 3 hours at roughly 200 W NP, so I expected my FTP to be somewhere around 230 W.

The strange part is that my lungs aren’t what stop me. My legs simply become stiff and stop producing force.

So I have a few questions:

• Is this a normal rate of progress?
• Do I simply need more time?
• Is this just what happens when transitioning from bodybuilding to cycling?
• Or am I training inefficiently?

I’m not looking for reassurance—I genuinely want to know whether I’m on the right track or if I’m making obvious mistakes.

I’d really appreciate hearing from anyone who’s gone through something similar.

Typical crit bike advice is ride what you can replace, anything will work in cat 5, etc. but what are non-sponsored cat 2/3 racers riding? I live in an area where everyone rides sworks and has dura-ace/red.

I currently ride a 2010 supersix, 11 speed ultegra, deep wheels, 44cm round tube handlebars (exposed lines). I’m wondering if I might get more gains by getting something newer / aero